U'khand: Khanduri to take oath as CM on Mar 8

Dehradun, Mar 3: Maj Gen (Retd) Bhuvan Chandra Khanduri will takeoath as the new Chief Minister of Uttarakhand on March 8, BJP sourcessaid today.

The time and place of the swearing-in ceremony will be decided later, they added.

Mr Khanduri was unanimously elected leader of BJP Legislature Party onMarch 1 after a five-hour party meeting in the presence of BJPobservers Gopinath Munde and Om Prakash Mathur. His name was proposedby BJP State Chief Bhagat Singh Koshyari and supported by MLA RameshPokhriyal Nishank. Mr Khanduri will be the fourth Chief Minister of thestate and third from the BJP after Mr Nityanand Swami and Mr Koshyari.

Mr Khanduri had won the race for the top post despite Mr Koshyarihaving more than 24 MLAs on his side. Mr Koshyari had later declarednot to hold any post in the BJP government and decided to continueservice to the party as state chief.

The BJP had emerged as the largest party in the recently concludedassembly elections winning 34 seats out of a total 69, for whichelection was held. Congress clinched 21 seats, BSP 8, UttarakhandKranti Dal 3 and Independents 3. BJP was one MLA short of a simplemajority to form the government and has received support from twoindependents and UKD, enabling it to form the government.

UNI